A: Oh god! man. See, English food, it’s difficult to explain. You get mashed potatoes with just about everything, and I ain’t gonna say anything good about that! [MELODY MAKER]

Q: What do you think of London?

A: It’s a different kind of atmosphere here. People are more mild-mannered. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

I like all the little streets and the boutiques. [MUZIEK EXPRESS]

It’s like a kind of fairyland. [HIT PARADE]

But you know what really turns me on about London? Just watching the girls go by. It’s a fantastic city for girlwatchers. They’re all so beautiful and so many different nationalities. [ELECTRIC GYPSY UNIDENTIFIED INTERVIEW]

Q: Do you smoke?

A: If I didn’t smoke I’d be fat as a pig. My nerves are very bad. I like tipped cigarettes mostly, alternating with menthol ones – about a pack over a day and a half. [DISC & MUSIC ECHO]

Q: Do you have any hobbies?

A: I like to watch the lightning. Especially on the fields and flowers when I’m on my own. I read a lot of science fiction. [DISC & MUSIC ECHO]

And I love reading fairy tales, like Hans Christian Andersen and Winnie-the-Pooh. [MORGENPOSTEN]

Q: What don’t you like?

A: I don’t like ordinary things or people with very neat eyebrows who look very neat. [HUMO]

Q: What kind of person are you?

A: I’m a little bit quiet, a little closed. Most of the time I don’t talk so much. What I have to say I say with my guitar. [HUMO]

Q: Immediate plans?

A: I want to stay in England. In the States I was always playing behind other people, and I found it difficult to contain myself. It’s much better now I have my own group. I understand there won’t be any difficulty getting work permits and so on as long as I’m a good little boy. [MUSIC MAKER]

Q: How important is your music to you?

A: For us it’s very important. If we stop playing we have no money to buy food with. [DENNY MILLER ARTICLE SWEDISH NEWSPAPER]

Q: Professional ambition?

A: I want to be the first man to write about the blues scene on Venus. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: Personal ambition?

A: To see my mother and family again. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: How long since you've been home?

A: About seven years. I don't even know my six-year-old sister. [POP]

I just called my dad once when I came to England to let him know I’d reached something. [HUMO]

Q: What did he say?

A: He asked me who I had robbed to get the money to go to England. [HUMO]

Actually, I’m scared to go home. My father is a very strict man. He would straight away grab hold of me, tear my clothes off and cut my hair! [POP]

I’d like to have enough money to send home to my father. One day I’m going to build him a house. Just to tease him a little bit, and because he paid for my first guitar. [HUMO]

Q: Why do you wear your hair like that?

A: I think maybe because my dad used to cut it all the time when I was a kid, and I used to go to school looking like a plucked chicken. Maybe that gave me a complex. [MUSIC MAKER]

Anyway, it’s better than having dull, straight hair. The strands, you see, are vibrations. If your hair is straight and pointing to the ground you don’t get many vibrations. This way, though, I’ve got vibrations shooting out all ways. [DISC]

Q: Why is it necessary to be dressed peculiarly?

A: Well, I don’t consider it actually necessary. [GERMAN RADIO]

This is the way I like to dress and look, off stage and on. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

I like shades of color that clash. [CHARLESTON GAZETTE]

I always wanted to be a cowboy or a Hadji Baba, or the Prisoner of Zenda. [‘HENDRIX’ – BIOGRAPHY BY VICTOR SAMPSON]

Before I go onstage my road manager says to me, “Jimi, you scruffy looking git, you’re not going on looking like that tonight, are you? And I say, “As soon as I’ve put out this cigarette – I’m fully dressed.” I feel comfortable like this. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: Where is fashion going?

A: I don’t know and I don’t care, really. Maybe people will wear different colored sheets, like in the olden days. And don’t ask me those silly questions about whether I wear underwear. I swear you should have gotten someone else for this interview. [EYE]

Second Interview:

Q: Are you glad to be back in London?

A: There’s no place like London. Basically, I’m a country cat. I go crazy in the city, but then I don’t consider London a city. It’s more relaxing. [DISC]

Q: Why do you carry two dimes in your shoe?

A: That was all I had when I landed in this country. [JACKIE]

Q: What do you think of the British police?

A: I think the police are very groovy over here. They don’t bother you very much. As a matter of fact I was walking down the street in London completely out of my mind, completely and utterly, and a police wagon came and they said, “Hi, Jimi, how are you doing?” and I replied, “Is it tomorrow – or just the end of time?” [L.A. FREE PRESS]

Q: Do you take LSD?

A: Do I look like I do? [BLICK]

Q: Why not?

A: Because it’s naked. I need oxygen. [MORGENPOSTEN]

Q: How does the British hippie scene compare to that in the States?

A: The movement is not as organized over here. They’ve just got weird looking cats. It’s a small thing, not like it is in the States. [L.A. FREE PRESS]

Q: Do the teachings of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi appeal to you?

A: I don’t really believe that his transcendental meditation is much more than day dreaming. If you really believe in yourself, you can think it out on your own. You don’t need someone else. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: What do you do in your spare time?

A: If I’m not working, I rarely leave the flat. Mostly I sit at home here playing records. [JACKIE]

I don’t like having to dress up and go to social parties much, but you just have to do it. I always have the feeling that I will arrive at one of these things in all my own gear, and they might not let me in. I like to leave all that to the glamour people as far as possible, the Engelberts and Tom Joneses. They are the ones who sing beautifully enough to have their voices in TV commercials. Me, I’m just trying to get my music together. [MELODY MAKER]

Q: What are your ambitions now?

A: Oh, that changes a hundred times a day. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

You never know what shape clouds are going to be before you see them. [DISC]

I have only one life to live. I might not be here tomorrow, so I’m doing what I’m doing now. [JAZZ & POP]

A: Yeah, I like kids. I guess I like them any age. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

Q: What about old people?

A: Some old people are a gas. In fact, a lot of older people are far groovier than some of my own generation. [DISC]

You’re only as old as you think you are. As long as your mind can still function you’re still young. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

Q: Can you think of yourself being eighty?

A: I don’t think I’ll be around when I’m eighty. There’s other things to do besides sitting around waiting for eighty to come along, so I don’t think about that too much. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

Q: Has making money changed you?

A: Well, with The Experience I really don’t know how much we earn today. We just get enough money every week for what we need. [POP]

I don’t give a damn so long as I have enough to eat and to play what I want to play. [HUMO]

Q: Is there anything you can’t do?

A: I can’t express myself in conversation. I can’t explain myself like this or that. So when we’re on stage, that’s all there is in the world. That’s my whole life. [TAPED INTERVIEW WITH TONY PALMER BACKSTAGE AT CLARK UNIVERSITY, WORCESTER, MASS]

Q: How far can you go with what you’re playing?

A: I don’t know. You can go on until you bore yourself to death, I guess. [UNIT]

I’m happy to be able to play like I feel now. [BILDJOURNALEN]

I play it by ear, man! [RAVE]

I know the audience is changeable, but I’m not afraid of tomorrow. [BILDJOURNALEN]

Q: Where do your songs come from?

A: From the people, from the traffic, from everything out there. [MUSIC NOW]

The whole world influences me. [KALEIDOSCOPE]

Everybody and everything is music. [KA-ROCK SCENE]

You don’t plan songwriting. You don’t get into a certain groove to write a song. You can get inspiration for a song any time, because music is just what you feel. [CLEVELAND PRESS]

The ideas come very easily. It’s just getting the song together to where it’s acceptable. [ARGO]

I stay in bed most of the time, or go to the park or somewhere. I write some of my best songs in bed, just laying there. I was laying there thinking of one when you came in. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

I dream a lot, and I put a lot of my dreams down as songs. [DUNDEE RECORDER]

Q: Do you dream in color?

A: Oh, definitely. The closest to a black and white dream I ever had was in pastel shades, you know? One time it was in pastel shades and it was maroon, very light maroon, and then this big gold cliff out of the middle of nowhere. It was great! That was the closest I ever got to black and white. [MEATBALL FULTON INTERVIEW TAPE]

Q: What’s your New Year’s resolution?

A: To keep the axis turning so that love follows music as the night the day. [DISC]

Third Interview

Q: Have you missed London?

A: It’s great to be in London again. [TOP POPS]

This is the place I feel most comfortable, and I feel the English are my friends. [MELODY MAKER]

The English girls are just too much. I was out walking yesterday and it must have been about five degrees below zero, but they were still walking around in their little miniskirts. Yes, we missed London. [TOP POPS]

Q: How do you like living in Handel’s house?

A: I didn’t even know this was his pad, man, until after I got in. [DAILY MIRROR]

Q: There’s a cherub with a broken arm on the ceiling…

A: That’s the groovy thing about him. He can fly with a broken arm. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: Do you have feelings for classical music?

A: Oh yeah, it’s beautiful, it’s very beautiful. [GERMAN RADIO]

I like Handel and Bach. It’s like a homework type of thing. You can’t hear it with friends all the time. You have to hear some things by yourself. [THE SUPERSTARS]

See, different music is supposed to be used in different ways. I believe the best time to listen to classical music is any time when it’s very quiet or your mind is very relaxed. When you feel like daydreaming, maybe… [GERMAN RADIO]

Q: Do you like classical rock?

A: To each his own. In another life the people who are trying to do it may have been Beethoven or one of those cats. But this is a rock and roll era, so the people get into rock. Every era has its own music. [HIT PARADE]

Q: What about jazz?

A: If l go to somebody else’s place and hear somebody else’s records, then I’d listen to jazz. But if I’m at home I’d never put on a jazz disc. I consider jazz to be a lot of horns and one of those top-speed bass lines. [MELODY MAKER]

If it’s axes… [MUSIC MAKER]

… I like to listen to it. But to play it – I don’t think that way. [MELODY MAKER]

I like free-form jazz, like Charlie Mingus and this other cat who plays all the horns, Roland Kirk. The groovy stuff instead of the old-time hits, like when they get up and play How High The Moon for hours and hours. [WEST ONE]

But I don’t happen to know much about jazz. I know that most of those cats are playing nothing but blues though – I know that much! [MELODY MAKER]

Q: Didn’t you play with Roland Kirk recently?

A: I had a jam with him at Ronnie Scott’s, and I really got off. It was great. I was so scared! It’s really funny. I mean, Roland, that cat gets all those sounds. I might just hit one note and it might be interfering, but we got along great I thought. He told me I should have turned it up or something. [INTERVIEW RECORDED BY JOHN BURKS]

We have different moods, and I think some are on the same level that Roland Kirk is doing. If people read this they’ll say, “That guy must be joking”, but I really think we are doing the same things. [MUSIC MAKER]

I really want to cut an album with Roland Kirk. He’s the most beautiful human being alive that plays jazz. [PLAIN DEALER]

He hasn’t really even started yet. When you hear him you can hear so much of the future. You can hear some of the things he’s going to go into. I mean, not necessarily by notes, but you can hear it by feelings. Running through a field, an everlasting field of beautiful things, man. [COPTER CLUB TAPE]

Q: How do you see the future of pop music?

A: I don’t know. I’m not a critic, you know. And I don’t like the word “pop”. All it means to me is Pilgrimage of Peace. [NANCY CARTER TAPE]

Q: How would you like your music to be described then?

A: We are trying to play real music. We don’t play blues, although some people seem to think we do. Rather we play a mix of blues, jazz, rock and roll and a lot of noise. [DENNY MILLER ARTICLE, SWEDISH NEWSPAPER]

We call our music Electric Church Music because it’s like a religion to us. [CBC INTERVIEW]

I don’t like the name “church” because it sounds too funky, too sweaty – you think of a person praying between his legs on the ground – but until we find something better we’ll have to use that. [ROLLING STONE]

A: All the things I thought were important before I had a hit record are just as important now. Trying to understand people and respect their feelings, regardless of your position or theirs. The beautiful things are still the same, the sunset and the dew on the grass. No material wealth changes the way I think about these things. If you’re looking for real happiness you go back to the happiest days you had as a child. Remember when playing in the rain was fun? [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: Has success changed you?

A: It depends on what you think is success. Success, to me, is like doing your utmost, achieving the ultimate. Well, I have not done that. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

I don’t consider myself even started yet. [NANCY CARTER TAPE]

I always try to get better and better, but as long as I’m playing I don’t think I’ll ever reach the point where I’m satisfied. [DOWNBEAT]

I think I shall always be looking for success. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: You have received the highest critical acclaim.

A: That’s part of the establishment’s game. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

They’re trying to blow us all up and give us awards so that they can just dust us away. But we’re not here to collect awards. We’re here to turn people on to the right way because there are some really strange scenes coming through. [SAN DIEGO FREE PRESS AND L.A. FREE PRESS]

Q: Are you going to play more concerts in England?

A: We plan to have the Albert Hall our last job for a while. [STOCKHOLM BACKSTAGE TAPE]

I wish we could play more places around the country because… [MUSIC MAKER]

… I dig England, and when we play here it is a big thing for us. [MELODY MAKER]

But the problem is we are doing more recording now, and… [MUSIC MAKER]

… we have to do an American tour in April and May. [INTERNATIONAL TIMES]

Q: Is there any truth in the rumors about you retiring?

A: You know, when you’re young, most people have a little burning thing, but then you get your law degree and go into your little cellophane cage. You can do the family thing. I’ve wanted to do that at times. I’ve wanted to go into the hills sometimes, but I stayed. Some people are meant to stay and carry messages. [DISTANT DRUMMER]

Fourth Interview

It’s a fantastic place to have a show because it brings the kids together from not only the British Isles but also the whole of the Continent. [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

Q: There were problems with some of the crowd.

A: You’re going to get that with five hundred thousand people. That’s way larger than the average city, and every city in the world always has a gang, the so-called outcasts. So you’re going to have gate-crashers, you’re going to have the other side of everything. [KEITH ALTHAM INTERVIEW TAPE]

Q: People were demanding that the music be free.

A: Well, they learned that from the papers. They didn’t do all that kind of mess with Monterey. [KEITH ALTHAM INTERVIEW TAPE]

Sometimes I feel we should do a free concert. I see the prices that the kids pay to see us, and it’s just ridiculous. [MUSIC NOW]

Q: What is the reason for the new, subdued Jimi Hendrix?

A: I felt maybe too many people were coming to see me and not enough to listen to me. [RECORD MIRROR]

My nature changed as well. I just hid for a bit… [RECORD MIRROR]

… and now I’m emerging as me. [TORONTO GLOBE & MAIL]

I suppose I’m growing up a bit. I feel as though I get little sparks of maturity every now and then. [MELODY MAKER]

Q: Do you ever see yourself settling down?

A: I couldn’t even think of a place where I’d like to live for the rest of my life… [HIT PARADE]

… but I’d like to settle someplace eventually. [MELODY MAKER]

Sometimes I am all alone and I say, “What are you doing here dressed up in satin shirts and pants!” [SUNDAY MIRROR]

I’ve got this feeling to have a proper home. I like the idea of getting married, just someone who I could love… [SUNDAY MIRROR]

… though one can never tell if the time is right. [DISC]

With music there’s no time for anything else. I’m already married to my music. [DISC & MUSIC ECHO]

Q: So marriage is not an option?

A: Marriage is a bit risky now. I’d really hate to get hurt. That would completely blow my mind. But I must admit I’d like to meet a quiet little girl now, probably one from the country, someone who doesn’t know anything about me and my reputation. [DISC]

One day I want to become a parent. Now that is what the world is all about. Having kids. Like planting flowers. [DAILY MIRROR]

I’ve always loved painting. In fact it was my first love when I was a child. I used to paint a picture of, say, a really pretty mountain, then write about four lines of poetry about it. I don’t hardly get a chance to paint now. [RECORD MIRROR]

Q: What plans do you have now?

A: I’d like to see as many places as I can and play in as many atmospheres as I can. [MELODY MAKER]

Your home isn’t America, it’s the Earth. [DISTANT DRUMMER]

I am planning a major world tour, either before or just after Christmas. I want to go to Japan… [MELODY MAKER]

… and Australia. [STOCKHOLM RADIO]

We really want to come back to England and do one big concert at each of the major cities. Jimi Hendrix at the Oval! [NEW MUSICAL EXPRESS]

I’d like to do Stonehenge, for the vibes. [MUSIC NOW]

In fact, I want the group to work all over the place. [MELODY MAKER]

I want to turn the world on. Music and sound waves are cosmic when they’re flying from one side to another. [MORGENPOSTEN]

Q: Any personal ambitions?

A: I’d like to have my own country, an oasis for the gypsy-minded people. My goal is to erase all boundaries from the world. [INTERVIEW FOR NEWSWEEK, TRANSCRIBED IN BIOGRAPHY BY DAVID HENDERSON]

I’d like to take part in changing reality. [KEITH ALTHAM INTERVIEW TAPE]

You have to set some heavy goals to keep yourself going. As long as I know there are people out there who aren’t fully together, I can’t withdraw to lesser goals. [INTERVIEW FOR NEWSWEEK, TRANSCRIBED IN BIOGRAPHY BY DAVID HENDERSON]

Q: Do you have enough money to live comfortably?

A: Ah, I don’t think so. Because I want to wake up in the morning and just roll out of my bed into an indoor swimming pool and then swim to the breakfast table, come up for air and maybe get a drink of orange juice, and then swim into the bathroom and, you know… have a shave. [KEITH ALTHAM INTERVIEW TAPE]

Q: You want to live luxuriously?

A: Is that luxurious? No! I was thinking about a tent, maybe, overhanging a mountain stream. [KEITH ALTHAM INTERVIEW TAPE]

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Starting at Zero

Starting at Zero (originally titled Room Full Of Mirrors) was produced without the input, assistance or authorization of Al Hendrix, Janie Hendrix, Experience Hendrix, L.L.C., or any parties associated therewith.